


Breaking Storm

by mogwai_do



Series: Embers [2]
Category: Highlander: The Series, The X-Files
Genre: M/M, Panic Attacks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-08
Updated: 2018-04-08
Packaged: 2019-04-20 07:35:14
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,935
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14256066
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mogwai_do/pseuds/mogwai_do
Summary: Some things even the most resilient need a bit of help to get over.





	Breaking Storm

The air was hot and close, thick and dark, wrapping him in a cocoon of nightmares. He'd always disliked humidity; he was far better suited to cold climes and, for all his grumbling, Methos was too. Mexico had been an unlikely destination for either of them and so it had been ideal. The usual dry heat wasn't a problem, but this haze had been building all day. The sky clouding into a heavy, featureless grey as the very air seemed to thicken around them.

In the week or so since his unexpected resurrection, Alex had thought he was doing well; his occasional nightmares of that place had faded quickly with the daylight and the touch of a lover. Methos had stayed with him, but let him make his own decisions, trusting Alex to ask if he needed anything more. It was a return to the normal pattern of their relationship and Alex appreciated it greatly. He wondered now if he should have asked the Immortal up here with him; at the time he had needed to be by himself, but now he wasn't sure why. Locked service elevators were no challenge to someone with his experience and the roof of the hotel had offered him a solitude not found elsewhere in the resort. At first he'd thought he had simply needed to escape the confines of their room which, despite the air conditioning, had been stifling. But now he wasn't sure he hadn't made a mistake that would cost him his sanity.

The night was pitch dark around him, crowded with the pressure of a storm that might never come, starlight and moonlight hidden by cloud. The rooftop gravel bit into his knees even through the heavy denim, tiny sharp pains that still seemed somehow distant. Breathing was a chore; the air was as thick and black as tar. The pressure was unrelenting, inside and out. The logical part of his brain told him a headache in this kind of weather was only to be expected, but his fears weren't listening. It was too easy to believe that he was back there again, that the last week had merely been the delusions of a broken mind clinging desperately to its rapidly eroding existence. Alex was shaking, he knew it, but he couldn't seem to stop. He tried to wrap his arms around himself, but the unfeeling plastic of his left arm plunged him deeper into the terror he fought with every laboured breath. He tore at his t-shirt frantically, trying to reach the buckles and straps beneath, unable to loosen them with a shaking hand. Hissing, Alex found his knife and the razored blade sliced through cloth and leather and skin with equal ease. He didn't feel the pain of the cuts, only the relief as the dead weight of the prosthetic fell away, the knife following. With his good hand he clutched the ruin of his shoulder, feeling slick skin and not knowing if it was sweat or blood or both. He had to look pretty fucking pitiful; sweating, dirty and maimed, slow trickles of blood running from the careless cuts in his shoulder and chest, his t-shirt hanging in shreds. He didn't feel real, didn't feel anything. The urge to laugh hit and he fought it, knowing that if he started now he'd never stop. Of all the times to finally lose it... when he was the safest he'd ever been.

The darkness pressed in around him and he swallowed thickly, wondering why the storm didn't break, wondering if he cut his own throat would he feel that... Alex tore his gaze from the faintly glinting knife blade; he couldn't do that, it simply wasn't in him, even now. Possibly it was one of the reasons he and Methos had always understood each other so well. Locked down tight by his own will, incapable of doing anything more, Alex knelt, shaking and rocking, clutching himself tight as he tried to hold himself together and prayed for the storm.

The crunch of gravel beneath booted feet was strangely muted in the dense air. By the time his fogged senses had registered their significance they were already within his limited line of vision. Alex blinked the sweat from his eyes, but he couldn't look up. There was only one person it could be, who cared enough about him and knew when to back off and when he was truly needed.

"Alex?" soft voice, sympathetic, empathetic, but never, ever pitying. Alex couldn't answer, couldn't make his throat work, couldn't look up. He was trapped and numb within himself.

A sudden sharp crack penetrated the oppressive fog wrapping his senses, the raw crackle of electricity prickling over his bare skin. Alex blinked, focusing with difficulty on the little he could see of his lover. The harsh light stung his eyes as it sparked and danced from his lover's skin to patter like rain on the ground. With a will of their own, Alex's eyes tracked up the long body, seeing its truest image in the streamers of light cascading over it. When he reached Methos' face he felt himself gasp, the normally dark eyes were lit from within, a fierce white light that could have overshadowed the sun. Was this what it had taken to bring him back? No fucking wonder mere death had relinquished its claim.

Of its own volition Alex's hand reached out and he felt the lightnings against his own skin; there and gone again too quickly to register, only feeling it when their touch awoke his nerves and made them scream for more. He'd met aliens, more than met, he probably knew more about what was out there than anyone else on the planet. Knowing their involvement with human development, he'd wondered once if Immortals hadn't been one of their experiments, abandoned and forgotten. Now he knew. This was natural; this was something that belonged to this world in ways far too complex to define. This was real power and the glimpse of a solution to the war that he'd never dared hope for.

"Methos," the name escaped on a sigh even as the sensations within his body heightened to a fever pitch of need. He groaned as his body buckled under the internal pressure, bending forward at the waist until his forehead almost touched the ground.

Alex felt the increased sizzle of lightning on his skin moments before he felt the warm weight of a gentle hand on his ruined shoulder. His nerves lit with the touch, an internal fire that stilled the shakes and burned through his veins with a fierce restless energy. Life in a way he'd never quite felt it before, it beat an adrenaline rush all to hell.

Alex surged up as Methos dropped to his knees; the ancient's mouth tasted of heat, a clean fire, with none of the actinic aftertaste he'd half-expected. Alex felt hands on his hips and he wrapped his arm tight around Methos' neck, pulling him closer, wanting that heat within himself. He was only half-aware of being borne back to the ground, Methos' solid weight above him as he was stripped. The kiss broke and Alex opened his eyes to meet Methos' incandescent gaze. The scream of his need drowned out every thought in its desperation for what only the Immortal could give. And Methos knew, Alex could see it in his eyes. Whatever Alex needed Methos would give and Alex needed this. Methos' Quickening flared again, almost obscuring his face and Alex gave himself up to Methos' seduction. The world melted away in a haze of heat and light and sensation. He could feel _everything_ , every sense heightened to the point where it almost overwhelmed him, was this the Immortality that Methos knew?

The sudden pressure/pain of Methos entering him brought Alex back to some semblance of coherence, but even the sharpness of the pain felt good. With an effort he focused on his lover's face, Methos' eyes were closed now and sweat sheened the fair skin, spiking the long lashes. Methos' Quickening still wreathed his limbs, flickering out like a snake's tongue to taste Alex curiously.

Alex arched his back as Methos pressed deep and he felt his heart stutter strangely within his chest. Slowly Methos' eyes opened, bright, far too bright for human, but still readable for all that. He said nothing but Alex knew Methos was waiting for confirmation and Alex had no hesitation in giving it, arching his back again as he wrapped his legs high around Methos' waist and pulled him close. The screaming need changed, transformed beyond all recognition into a song of pure sensation as Methos began to move. Alex smiled once, a strangely twisted smile, reflection of all he had felt this night, and he reached up to wrap his good arm around Methos' shoulders, stroking the smooth, hot skin as he claimed Methos' mouth with his own. Letting his head fall back, Alex closed his eyes, giving himself over to his Immortal lover as each thrust took him higher and higher. Behind his eyelids fleeting images coalesced then wisped away like smoke, barely there, yet leaving an indelible impression. Desert and tundra, forest and ocean; love, hate, fear, loss, hope, joy and cold calculation; life, death, rebirth. Alex gasped, eyes opening unseeingly as climax washed over and through him, powerful and endless as the sky above; life, death, rebirth, a roaring whirlpool of sense and knowledge that dragged him under effortlessly.

Alex's eyes snapped open as the first heavy raindrop splashed onto his chest and the rumble of thunder filled his ears. He felt heavy and weightless at once, exhausted and energised, like he'd been pounded flat in the best possible way. He turned his head slowly, unsurprised to see Methos at his side, propped up on one elbow, watching over him. The rain was coming down hard now, tiny chill impacts all over his body and he didn't really remember getting naked much at all. His madness, however fierce, had been short-lived.

"Thanks," he murmured and Methos quirked a half-smile.

"You're welcome."

Long fingers came to rest on his belly, drawing abstract patterns in the semen splashed there even as the rain washed it away. Alex could feel himself calming, relaxing almost against his will. Methos looked... normal now. Not unassuming in the Adam Pierson sense, but at ease with himself and the situation. He didn't have to hide what he was, nor did he have to hold it up for all to see. Alex knew that feeling well, masks had always been unnecessary in each other's company.

Alex covered the hand on his belly and lifted it into his line of sight. Long, strong fingers he'd felt many times before in whatever capacity they were needed; lover, doctor, friend, accomplice. He twined his own fingers with Methos', twisting their joined hands this way and that as he studied them, not entirely sure what he was looking for. The sudden faint crackle and oddly ticklish sensation against his palm wasn't the surprise it should have been. Alex watched the miniature lightning storm as it wound its way from Methos' hand to his, then turned to meet his lover's eyes. He knew the look in his own eyes was less of a question than a basic belief, but Methos answered it anyway. "Whatever you need Alex, whenever and however you need it."

Alex closed his eyes in relief he was sure the Immortal could read and brought their clasped hands back down to his chest. Some things could be relied on.


End file.
